


Hold The Line (Love Isn't Always On Time)

by Galadriel1010



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Author is pretentious, Breaking Up & Making Up, Getting Back Together, M/M, This is Paia's fault., Time Skips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-18 15:48:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29736180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Galadriel1010/pseuds/Galadriel1010
Summary: The timing was wrong, and wrong again, and then right.
Relationships: Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade
Comments: 5
Kudos: 64
Collections: JustMystradeThoughts Plot Bunny Adoptions





	Hold The Line (Love Isn't Always On Time)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Paia_Loves_Pie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paia_Loves_Pie/gifts).



> Happy birthday Paia! Keep handing us bunnies to love and cherish <3
> 
> Title from the song by Toto.

**2015** – Mycroft kisses like Greg remembers, like they have all the time they need, like they're 23 and 27 and the world is at their feet, like they never stopped. Half of him wishes they hadn't, but the other half is a realist. The man across the table from him is not the same man he was twenty years ago when Greg kissed him goodbye, or even ten years ago on a dark street corner. The Greg and Mycroft of the past hadn't been ready. Now he is. When Mycroft pulls back to smile at him, he knows Mycroft is too.

* * *

**1995** – The summer of '95 was hot and golden. Even at night, the heat seeping from the tarmac and bricks kept it sultry. When he looked back on it through the haze of memory it was the perfect summer, but rose-tinted nostalgia stripped away the sticky discomfort and simmering tension. The pressure had been building for months, lowering over and around everything, until the air crackled with it. And that was just in Mycroft's Holborn flat. Outside the window, the tension snapped and seared as jagged forks across the skyline, rain splattering and hammering across the pavement and rooftops. Lightning lit the kitchen and less than three seconds later thunder rolled in through the open window. Less than a mile away. Greg's chest heaved and he fought back the urge to cry or scream. He'd expected an argument, followed by angry make-up sex and a vow that whatever happened they'd see it through together. He should have known that Mycroft was entirely too sensible for that.

He scrubbed a hand across his face and nodded. He didn't keep much at Mycroft's, even after months, and nothing he couldn't afford to leave behind. It wasn't the weather for trudging across town, but the storm was cathartic. He wanted to be soaked to the skin with lightning crashing overhead. He wanted to go back an hour to before he opened his bloody mouth.

At least Mycroft couldn't look him in the eye either. He'd gone to the window, where he'd braced his hands against the counter and leaned forwards to look out at the tempest. The lightning washed across his face again and Greg flinched away. His mouth opened, but he closed it again when no adequate words came to mind.

"Perhaps ten years from now we'll meet again, in some coffee shop on a distant corner, and start over," Mycroft said.

Greg wanted to say 'fuck you'. He wanted to say a lot of things. He said none of them. Just grabbed his jacket and walked out into the rain.

* * *

**2005** – On a cold, wet night in the arse end of the arse end of London, the convenient proximity of the crime scene to a decent late-night café was more than offset by the arrival of Sherlock Holmes, possibly high, definitely irritating and, annoyingly, probably right. Greg got him away from the scene before he could contaminate it too badly and, importantly, before the DI saw him, and bundled him into the coffee shop where he could buy them both a bit of time as long as he came back with enough drinks to go round the murder team. The noddy suits would have the run of the scene until morning, not that they'd find anything in this rain, and then when decent, reasonable people started waking up it would be up to the proper coppers to go door to door and confirm that no one saw anything.

The door jingled behind them whilst Sherlock was explaining exactly how the case was connected to a high-profile theft in Bermondsey, and Greg looked over hurriedly to reassure whoever had been sent in after them that he was just waiting for the coffees to be done. Instead of one of the constables, though, he found himself staring into eyes he'd honestly thought he'd never see again. Sherlock turned to see what he was staring at and cursed, effusively.

"Oh for god's sake. I am clean! I'm helping the police with their enquiries, actually." He waved a hand in Greg's general direction. "They need all the help they can get, after all. Honestly, I don't know why you bother."

"Oi!"

Sherlock ignored him and kept addressing Mycroft. "And stop looking at him like that. You're definitely not his type. He's married, two kids and a third on the way, and he doesn't need you poking your enormous nose into his life."

Greg cleared his throat. "I take it this is the infuriating little brother you told me about, Mike?"

"I'm afraid so." Mycroft rubbed at his eyebrow and stared at a point somewhere on the floor just behind where Greg was standing. "I see you are acquainted."

Sherlock looked between the two of them, pennies dropping almost audibly. "You two…"

"Old friends," Mycroft said. "We haven't seen each other in…"

He trailed off, and that's when Greg remembered Mycroft's parting shot and knew that Mycroft remembered it too. "Ten years," he murmured.

The girl behind the counter finally finished Heyhoe's complicated coffee order and set it on a tray with the rest of them, so Greg turned round and stabbed a finger at Sherlock. "Take that lot over to the tape. Do not cross it, alright? You take it over and tell them I'm going to be over in a minute and asked you to deliver the coffees. They'll put up with you getting a look until I get back, alright?"

Sherlock looked torn between delight at getting to look at the scene, and absolute horror at whatever was about to transpire between Greg and Mycroft. Greg didn't have the excitement of the crime scene to temper it, so he followed Sherlock out onto the street, lit a cigarette and offered one to Mycroft. "I keep saying I'll quit," he muttered around it as he fumbled the lighter back into his pocket. "Never seems to work."

"That's addiction for you. It only really works if you get a clean break." Mycroft accepted the cigarette and pulled that familiarly judgemental face at the first drag, but he didn't comment on it. "I feel I must assure you; this wasn't planned, and I cannot foresee the future."

Greg chuckled. "Is that something I should have worried about?" One look at Mycroft's face told him enough. "You did take over the world, then?"

"Not all of it, but I'll get there." He flicked ash off onto the floor and tipped his face up into the rain a little. "How have you been?"

"Good, yeah. Married… a while now." He didn't want to admit just how long. Jenna was a bit of a rebound, but it had worked out so far. It had worked out until Mycroft breezed into the coffee shop. He cleared his throat. "What about you? Apart from running the world, I mean."

Mycroft smiled. "Alas, running the world leaves little time for anything more. I am well, though."

They nodded at each other and, for want of something to talk about, Greg looked over towards the crime scene again. Sherlock was behaving himself, for now, but he was still nervous. "He's good, your brother. Pain in the arse, though."

"That's a succinct summary." Mycroft sighed. "I knew he'd found a distraction. When he went out tonight, rather unexpectedly, I decided it was high time I got to the bottom of it."

"High time is right."

He shook his head. "I don't think so, actually. I believe he's telling the truth. He's had an unusual focus, the like of which I haven't seen in him since he left university. How long has he been hanging around your cases?"

"Mine? Five months, maybe? I know he's been floating around a while, though."

"And you had no idea he was my brother?" Mycroft studied him curiously. "Why do you put up with him?"

Greg shrugged. "Holmes isn't an uncommon name, you know. It's not like bloody Lestrade." That didn't answer the question, though, and Mycroft's fond glare reminded him of that gently. "He's good is Sherlock. I don't think he'd make it in the police, but he'd be a good private detective if he could keep focused for ten minutes. He just needs someone to give him a chance. And honestly, we need all the help we can get."

"I suspected as much. You haven't changed at all."

He laughed. "I really have."

"Not in the ways that matter." Mycroft watched him, and eventually gave him a wry smile. "I'm pleased that my mystery has been solved, at least. I wish you luck with yours."

Greg knew he should let Mycroft walk away, precisely because it was the last thing he wanted to do. He'd called out Mycroft's name before he knew what he was going to do about it, and in the end said the first thing that came into his head. "I'll keep an eye on him. As much as I can."

"Thank you." Mycroft struggled with some internal debate for a few seconds, then stepped back towards Greg and held out a business card. No logo, no details. Just his name and phone number on good cardstock. If you got one of these, you were important enough not to need more, and to have your calls answered. "If you ever need anything…"

Greg wanted to kiss him. He'd never stopped. But he just took the card, saluted Mycroft with it, and walked away.

* * *

**1995** – Greg wasn't really looking for anything that night. It had been a long week and Soho was always good for a night out, full of enough tourists and squaddies that even as coppers they could blend in. He found a corner of the bar to prop up, got a pint in his hand and settled in to scan the crowd. A moment later his eyes landed on the ginger bloke sitting at a table with a group of friends or colleagues. Their eyes met, Greg felt himself smile, and then Mycroft was coming towards him.

"I realise you've just started one, but perhaps you'll let me buy your next. And maybe breakfast."

For the rest of the summer, Greg barely spent a night in his own bed. When he was on nights they met for breakfast and then spent the day roaming the city. Sometimes they wandered the city by night, too, and sat in abandoned squares and gardens to talk about everything and nothing. Greg saw more of London's museums in those few months than in the rest of his life. Mostly, though, they spent it in bed. It was the first time that he really knew someone else's body better than his own. He was lost and in love, and drunk on it. Mycroft was fascinating and beautiful and incredible, and Greg would happily have drowned in him. They lay awake, tangled in the sheets and each other for as long as they could stand the heat. And if Greg spent his days in a dream, longing for the end of his shift and his return to Mycroft, he didn't care. There were more important things. Well, one. Mycroft.

He didn't know any of that that night in Soho, though. Just that a gorgeous smile and dazzling eyes wanted to buy him breakfast. He grinned back, raised his glass in toast, and accepted whatever was offered.

* * *

**2015** – It's a standing arrangement by now, coffee on a Thursday afternoon as long as work permits. Mycroft is still full of stories, and it stopped being about work years ago. Greg realises that he's staring when Mycroft stops mid-flow, and his eyes drop to Greg's lips. It's the easiest, most natural thing in the world to lean across the table and kiss him. He tastes of coffee and Victoria sponge, and his smile against Greg's lips is warm and soft. Greg cups his cheek, strokes a thumb across afternoon stubble, and breathes in bone-deep contentment. It's time to start over.


End file.
